Pontiac, MI – For this year’s UW-Madison Formula SAE Racing Team, competition didn’t turn out as they had hoped. Entering the competition with a 2nd place finish to improve upon and an impressive car to back it up, the team had plans to be holding up that 1st place trophy on Sunday. But a blown engine in the endurance section of the event kept UW-Madison off the podium.

The first day of competition fared well for the team. They quickly passed the tech inspection and proceeded to the brake and noise events. With a decibel reading of 109 (110 is required to pass), the team excitedly moved on to the brake event. After noon on Thursday, the car’s brakes locked up and another hurdle was passed. Meanwhile, the team was judged on Design (15th place), Cost (9th place), and Business Presentation (28th place).

The competition’s dynamic events began Friday morning with the running of the skidpad and acceleration events. Drivers Pete Allex and Colin Quinn guided the team to a first place skidpad performance just before the rain started to fall with a quick time of 5.4 seconds. After the rain subsided, Jacob Bergenske and Alan Gardiner gave the acceleration event all they had. The wet track didn’t help, as the UW team earned a 39th place in the event with a time of 4.726.

Friday afternoon brought up the autocross event. This event features two laps taken by two different drivers. With lap times of 112.30 and 109.96 seconds, Tim Isenberg set great times for the rest of the pack. UW’s second driver, Tim Flaten, matched those times, earning a 112.79 and another 109.96 second lap. The top 20 teams were separated by a mere 4.4, seconds, and UW ended up with a 20th place finish in the event.

Finally, the endurance event commenced on Saturday. After 14 teams in the slower half of the pack finished the event in the morning, the teams started the 22 lap, 22km race in the afternoon. When UW came up in the order, the best lap times were around 61 seconds. Things were looking good for the UW, as driver Tim Flaten was putting up times in the 61 second range, while still being held up by slower cars in front of him. Little known to many other people in the stands, a shifting problem limited Tim to use of the first gear only. After 6 laps of hitting the rev limiter, the Suzuki GSXR 600 finally gave up. A cloud of smoke and small oil fire ensued, and two large holes in the engine now tell the tale of how UW was knocked out of the 2003 Formula SAE Competition.

Despite the disappointing finish this year, the UW Formula SAE Racing Team has a good outlook for the future. They will lose perennial go-to man Dan Schum, team leader Rob Ruppel, driver Tim Flaten, Mike Major (intake), Jason Jameson (exhaust), Kirk Wittwer (cost report), and several other valuable team members. However, this year’s young team brought 38 people to competition, all of whom learned a great deal to put towards the “204.” With a great suspension, solid frame design, reliable powertrain, and a great business group, the lessons of the 203 will lead the 204 to that elusive first place.